


Infinite white

by WahlBuilder



Series: Scarves and Mittens [16]
Category: Darksiders (Video Games)
Genre: Gen, Magic, Or Is It?, Pre-Slash, Snow, Teleportation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-29
Updated: 2016-12-29
Packaged: 2018-09-13 03:23:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9104500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WahlBuilder/pseuds/WahlBuilder
Summary: Azrael shouldn't have tried to teleport while being exhausted. He ends up stuck in a freezing world, but then someone arrives to keep him company.





	

‘My lord, is it… wise?’

Azrael opened his eyes, squared his shoulders and straightened his wings. He had to appear more energetic than he felt, otherwise his guardian host would not hesitate to bind him. But while he could successfully deceive the warriors, he would be unlike to do so with his pupil. And by the look on Syrinel’s face he saw that she was not convinced.

‘I’m all well, Syrin,’ he said quietly. ‘I can handle a teleportation, and I cannot miss the opening ceremony of the All Souls’ Day again.’ He started to get up from the fallen tree, and his pupil hastened to help him. He thought about telling her something, that he’s not old, that he really was well, but he was too tired to have any more arguments.

The guard host looked with alarm at him, and he waved. ‘Please, find the nearest gate and proceed to the White City. I will be well on my own, and I must make haste.’

Syrin let go of his arm, and for a single moment he contemplated taking her with him, but then decided that his current state wouldn’t allow him to teleport her, too. She stepped away, and he tried to ignore her wary gaze as he focused on making the necessary incantations and weaving them into a spell with his fingers.

He stumbled over the twelfth word, and the hammock swam around him, but he focused on the glowing gold-white portal before him and finished the incantation, then stepped into the portal, aching to return to the safety of the White City, and, preferably, straight to his own spire, though that had to wait until the ceremony is concluded—

He yelped as his legs sunk into something cold, and flapped into the air, sleep leaving him immediately.

It was not the White City.

Although it was white—as far as Azrael could see; endless white, so that land and sky were one enormous vastness without seams. It looked as if Azrael were falling into the white without being able to glide on his wings.

And it was snowing.

Azrael jumped off the snow and tried to stay in the air, it immediately exposed his feet, damp from the sunk in the snow, to the biting cold. The snow—huge, beautiful flakes—were piling on his wings, weighing them down, piling on his clothes, melting and soaking them through.

Soon, his own raiments were too heavy, and he landed back into the snow, his feet sinking to the mid-shins and the bottom of his robe lay on the snow, and then was covered with thick flakes.

Azrael wrapped his wings about himself, but it jostled the snow piled on them and some of it slid under his collar and melted, and made its way down his chest in a chilling stream. Soon, he was shivering, then he was trembling, then—he was shaking. The snow fell onto his eyelashes, pasting up his eyes, and he couldn’t focus.

Such an inglorious fate.

Azrael’s teeth began clattering.

He was contemplating falling on the snow and curling in his wings while waiting for either chill to claim him or his energy to restore enough for him to be able to leave this place, when he sensed a shudder running through the web of magic energies.

At first he thought it was his own shuddering, but along with the shuddering, the web was singing in a distorted harmony.

Could it by that Syrinel had somehow tracked him and came to his rescue?

But the web was trembling and shrinking, pushing the snow and Azrael’s freezing body to the back of the angel’s mind, and it was the movement of the predator. The movement of the spider.

Azrael had no means of protecting himself, and the dagger on his belt wouldn’t help him against whatever was tearing into this world.

Azrael wrapped his wings about himself as tight as he could. The wing joints were aching with the cold.

The snow stopped falling. Oh, for a single breath it hovered still in the air as if suspended on invisible threads. Then the air cracked with discharge, a vertical tear appeared in the perfect cold whiteness of this world. On the other side of the tear, fire was burning and forming sigils that oozed black blood.

Then with a hiss of melting snow that quickly turned into clouds of steam, a figure stepped out of the tear that closed immediately behind it.

A long tail with twisted rusty nails piercing it through swept around, and wherever it touched the snow, it melted, running away from such an intrusion. Enormous wings, so twisted, torn they were upside down and it was impossible to look at them without feeling a dull ache, spread around, widening the circle of melting and vaporising water around the figure.

But before the snow that Azrael was standing in started to melt, a wave of smell reached the angel, poured into his lungs, swept the flakes off his wings. The smell of brimstone, yes—all demons smelled of brimstone,—but the unique sweet smell of rotting apples, of wine turning into vinegar, the smell of fallen autumn leaves, dying on the ground and promising a good harvest with their death.

With the smell came a wave of hot air—the breath, smelling of the sweetest wine,—and Azrael closed his eyes as it chased the chill out of his bones.

‘Such an honour,’ rumbled a voice with mockery—like a pile of rocks rolling down the mountainside to destroy everything on its way, ‘to see the Watcher of the Well here.’

Snow melted around Azrael’s feet, ruining the bottom of his robe completely, and soon a stream of warm water was running around him.

The flakes in the air stuttered, one moment trying to keep still, the next moment moving in all directions away from the towering Blood Prince.

Azrael raised his eyes and held the burning gaze.

There was terrible beauty about Samael, the perfect symmetry of the face and the distorted symmetry of the horns—like a distorted version of ram horns and great antlers.

Azrael spread his wings, feathers and clothing steaming from the presence of the great demon. ‘Is this your realm, Samael?’ he said, mustering all his strength to not let his voice waver. ‘I thought you preferred warmer places.’

The chains hanging from Samael’s belt clanged as he made another slow step to Azrael, chuckling low in his throat—a sound not unlike that of a groundshake. ‘It is not mine. I felt your presence, but it was strange.’

‘I am here by accident.’

Samael’s gaze didn’t waver, but Azrael couldn’t be intimidated by that.

This contemplative gaze was familiar.

‘You are weak,’ said Samael quietly. ‘Exhausted. It’s dangerous to travel between realms alone like this.’ He had none of the pose or always boiling anger in his voice anymore, none of the mockery, and Azrael watched and watched, and almost could see the fiery white in the eyes burning with vile fire… 

‘I can help you reach your destination.’ Samael came so close to Azrael that he could feel the burning heat of the demon’s body, hear the crackling of the inner flame. Samael was much taller, bigger than Azrael, but his head was bowed to the angel intimately. Azrael thought how heavy carrying such horns had to be.

He smiled. ‘You can’t. My destination is the White City.’

‘Ah,’ Samael purred, ‘of course. I cannot ruin your reputation by letting you appear there reeking of demonic filth.’ His gaze raked over Azrael’s body, and Azrael couldn’t suppress a shiver.

He blamed the sudden heat filling his body on Samael’s proximity.

There was a sound like of a giant leather curtain being spread, and Samael’s wings circled them both. Closing behind Azrael, they brushed his wings, and he jerked them closer to himself.

In the dark dome of this cocoon every sound seemed amplified to Azrael’s ears: his own quickening breathing, the rumble of fire under Samael’s skin, the soft chiming of Samael’s chains, the rustling of Azrael’s own robe as he realised how really close they stood to each other. If he wished, he could reach out and touch the armour plates bolted to the left side of Samael’s chest. Soothe the pain. Trace the carved markings on Samael’s right side…

Nobody could see them here, not even the Creator.

He would reek of demon anyway.

‘My hands are cold,’ Azrael whispered. ‘I need to wait until my energy is restored, but my fingers are freezing and I can’t create sigils.’ Entranced by Samael’s eyes—two candle-flames in the darkness of the cocoon—he reached out, and Samael took his hands. The demon’s palms were very dry and scorching hot, and holding Azrael’s very carefully.

‘I shall stay with you,’ Samael said, and his wine-sweet breath caressed Azrael’s face, ‘until you recover your strength.’ Then, Samael smiled, all teeth. ‘Ought to give you mittens, Watcher. It would be a shame if you froze to death.’

Azrael couldn’t say whether Samael was serious or not. But to think how much of a ruckus such a gift would bring to the White City… ‘I’ll be honoured to receive such a gift from you.’


End file.
